Working together for safer city streets

25 May

11:00 - 12:30

Hall 1, Level +1

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Summary

A growing number of cities in the world have adopted "Vision Zero" as their policy to reduce road traffic fatalities and serious injuries. To reach this objective and contribute to cleaner, healthier, inclusive and efficient urban mobility, it will be necessary to implement a Safe System approach in road safety. This session drew on work developed within the ITF’s Safer City Streets network and discussed policies and practices to make city streets safe.

Increased urbanisation and urban mobility have created challenges for city planning. In Lisbon and New York City, the majority of traffic fatalities are pedestrians or cyclists. As noted by Paulo Humanes, policy makers should anticipate a growing presence of vulnerable road users in cities, and make their protection a priority.

Andrew McKellar stressed that a lot can be learnt from cities that have already adopted “Vision Zero”. For example, New York City (winner of 2018 ITF Transport Achievement Award) focused on four major policies to make the traffic system safer by targeting infrastructure investment in intersections for pedestrian and cyclist safety; reducing speed limits from 30 to 25 mph for all city streets; increasing investment in safety campaigns and enhancing both manual and automated enforcement. Although Michael Replogle believed there is still a long way to go, their approach has been effective, with road deaths on New York City streets falling by 28% and pedestrian fatalities falling by 45%.

The use of cameras to reduce speed was highlighted by several speakers, including Miguel Gaspar and Gloria Hutt. Ms Hutt saw a 30% reduction in fatalities related to excess speed with the use of cameras in Chile. Mr Gaspar also praised the use of fixed cameras in eliminating crashes in controlled zones and urged other cities to follow.

Paulo Humanes and Andrew McKellar believed there are new tools (such as NCAP and iRAP) and new data sources (increasingly in real-time) to support safer travel. Anne Graham underlined the importance of sharing data and that the ITF data has provided opportunities for cities to benchmark performance against other cities. For Andrew McKellar, cities need empirical evidence: to help identify problems, define policies and support advocacy. For this reason, the FIA is proud to renew their support, for the next three years, for the ITF Safer City Streets initiative.

While there are tools to help understand safety risks, user perceptions and preferences, one of the critical success factors is political leadership. This view was shared by Minister Genter, Minister Hutt and Mr Replogle. In addition, Minister Genter and Mr Replogle both acknowledged the crucial roles of advocacy groups as they can facilitate open dialogue between the communities and the government. These groups can help obtain better buy-in before implementing tough policies such as reducing urban speed or deploying speed cameras. Minister Genter also encouraged the use of trials to pre-test policy and to gain better buy-in.

When asked about what policy is the most important, Ms Graham believed the traditional 3E’s (enforcement, education and engineering) are still important. While enforcement typically delivers the greatest return, education is needed to change attitudes in order to obtain sustained impacts. There was agreement that more sustainable transport systems contribute to safety at the same time as better health and delivering economic benefits. Moreover, with increased reliance on pedestrian access and cycling essential to meeting the UN Sustainable Development Goals, safe streets will be essential if the targets are to be met. Integration of transport, housing, economic development and health policies was seen as important to support the goal of “access for all”.